


Unlikely Friends, Unseen Enemies

by Elendiliel



Series: A Medic's Guide to the Galaxy [1]
Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Enemies to Friends, Force Empathy (Star Wars), Other, Planet Yavin 4 (Star Wars), Post-Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-11
Updated: 2020-09-17
Packaged: 2021-03-06 14:28:36
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 8,300
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26410390
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Elendiliel/pseuds/Elendiliel
Summary: Armitage Hux's first, somewhat unofficial, mission for the Resistance possibly wouldn't be going to plan even if the other half of his team had had one. Neither he nor the mission "commander" (a medic he first met in an interrogation cell) would ever have predicted this kind of situation, but here they are. And they're about to be reminded that both danger and salvation can come from unexpected quarters.
Series: A Medic's Guide to the Galaxy [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1954132
Comments: 4
Kudos: 3





	1. Strange Allies

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Sanctuary](https://archiveofourown.org/works/22006582) by [CaptainXcamino](https://archiveofourown.org/users/CaptainXcamino/pseuds/CaptainXcamino). 



> Warning: there are some gaping plot holes in this story, of which I am well aware but for which I have no solutions that don't spoil the narrative. If anyone can remedy this, please let me know. Help with tags and ratings would also be gratefully received, this being my first foray into fanfiction.

“I know you’re good with your hands,” Armitage Hux said quietly, not taking his eyes off the approaching soldiers, “but how are you with a blaster?”

His companion paused for a moment, probably checking that her answer was accurate – or that she had interpreted the question correctly. “None too keen, but above median, I think.”

“Good enough?”

Another pause. Hux could sense that she was fighting to keep hold of her blaster, rather than drop it and try to defend them both the way she knew best. “Only one way to find out.”

At a signal from their leader, the ring of stormtroopers had halted a few metres away. “Put down your weapons and give back everything you stole from us. If you do that, we won’t hurt you.”

 _He’s lying._ Hux didn’t need the young woman’s uncanny senses, or the strange bond between them, to know that. No First Order soldier could fail to recognise their ex-General, presumed executed for treason – or (unless they had been among Hux’s own students) to try to carry out the death sentence again. And while Nurse Elinor Macnab – El in combat and other emergencies, Elinor the rest of the time – was one of the least soldier-like Resistance members he had ever met, her professional stance and clear familiarity with the detested blaster gave quite a different impression. Had he been alone, or in command, bolts would have already been flying, and stars help anyone who stood in his way.

But he wasn’t in command. El, as the only oathsworn Resistance member of their tiny fire-team, was, and she always tried to find a non-violent solution first. (Macnab’s First Rule: talk first, shoot later if necessary.) “How do I know I can trust you?” Out of habit, she pitched her voice lower than usual and tried to lace it with generic Outer Rim, hiding her natural and out-of-place accent as best she could. The less evidence, however circumstantial, of Resistance activity here on Yavin IV, the better.

“You don’t. Now, put the gun down, little girl, before someone gets hurt!” Hux had to lay the mental equivalent of a restraining hand on her psychic arm before she did anything she would regret – or that would get her killed. She could handle threats, but calling a veteran of Crait “little girl” was fighting talk. Especially as she was twenty-three, five foot nine and broader across the shoulders than Hux himself.

“Can I make another suggestion?” Her accent and mannerisms were already slipping. So, he knew through her, was the self-control of some of the troopers. As the verbal sparring continued, he assessed their chances of escaping unscathed – that was to say, no more scathed than they were already – if that control broke altogether. Reasonable, he thought, if they both moved fast and the soldiers weren’t particularly good shots. Being outnumbered actually gave them an edge in those circumstances, as their opponents would be more likely to hit each other than their quarry. He was glad of that thought when somebody finally ran out of patience and all the Sith hells broke loose.

 _What would Brendol think of this?_ He thought almost idly, as he dodged a nearly-too-close blaster bolt while El spun round to stun its originator, before he stepped forward to return the favour. She was a fairly good shot, as it turned out – nowhere near his level, of course, but stun bolts needed rather less finesse. (Macnab’s Second Rule: if fighting is inevitable, keep casualties minimal and fatalities to none whatsoflippingever when possible. On either side.) As they ducked and twisted and all but danced to the rhythm of the flying lasers, he tried to imagine what the Commandant would say if he could see his only son now – branded a traitor (although Hux considered that he had betrayed only Ren’s distorted vision for the Order), hailed as a hero by his nominal enemies and facing down his former soldiers, back to back with someone Brendol would certainly have described as a _filthy Rebel –_

 _No._ He couldn’t finish the phrase the way his _father_ would surely have done, even in the privacy of his own head. It just didn’t fit her. None of that description did. She was by nature as fastidious as her somewhat messy and extremely time-consuming calling (so much more than a job) allowed, and in her eyes _rebel_ implied that the First Order had at any time had any political legitimacy, which she didn’t believe. (He’d learned not to argue with her on that point. Neither of them ever got anywhere.) He wondered whether Brendol Hux and his friends had ever really _known_ their enemies; whether, had they done so, they would have seen that the qualities El and so many like her idealised and tried, however erratically, to embody – love and compassion, kindness and gentleness, generosity and selflessness, hope and trust, justice tempered with mercy – were not in point of fact synonymous with weakness and cowardice. They were, after all, what had held the Resistance together despite everything the First Order had thrown at them. His intervention might have made their victory at Exegol possible, but their courage and determination had made it happen. Worth bearing in mind…

A sharp spike of pain from El recalled him to reality. A lucky shot had taken her blaster out of her hands, destroying it and scorching her fingers. Without appearing to falter, trusting him – _him!_ – to cover her, she switched to the combat mode she preferred – unarmed and no holds barred – and tackled the nearest stormtrooper to the ground before he realised what was happening. A thump on the helmet kept him there. (Macnab’s Third Rule: the floor is not a friend, but do introduce your opponent to it as fast and painlessly as possible.) Three more followed him before the others registered that the young woman who looked like just a face in the crowd, hardly noticed even without a crowd around her, could also be an elbow in the ribs, an arm around the knees, a fist under the jaw or a boot in the chest. Her technique would have had Phasma shaking her head in dismay, but it was clearly effective. She made every gram of bodyweight and joule of energy count, and knew every weak point of both stormtrooper armour and the human body. Between that, the Force humming through her (more than compensating for her natural lack of coordination) and not least Hux picking off any threat to either of them, they were soon in a position to make a break for safety. As she retrieved her med-kit – as precious and necessary to her as a Jedi’s or Sith’s sabre, but a liability in combat – from its hiding place in a nearby tree and they made all speed along the path that would eventually lead to the Resistance base and sanctuary, he recalled the first time he had seen her in action, and consequently their first meeting. The circumstances could hardly have been more different.


	2. Friendly Foes

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm not sure whether some things I've referenced in this chapter actually count as canon-typical violence, so if I need to update the tags or rating, please let me know ASAP. I may also have taken some liberties with medical reality here and in a later chapter to fit the story; if so, please forgive a pharmacologist's ignorance.

_“This is the prisoner?” The question seemed redundant, given that this was a Star Destroyer’s interrogation cell, but some things had to be done._

_“Yes, General.” The stormtrooper assigned to this cell stood to parade-ground attention. “Rebel fighter, caught passing classified information to her friends disguised as one of our officers.” Hux refrained from pointing out that he was not blind. The slim figure on the table in front of him still wore what appeared to be a First Order lieutenant’s uniform, stolen or faked like the identity documents she had been carrying._

_“_ Resistance _, if you don’t mind.” The prisoner’s voice slipped through the air like rough silk. Her accent was cut-glass, mid-Rim bordering on Core Worlds, and Hux, who had an ear for such things, would swear that it sounded pre-Imperial. An Old Republic accent from a girl younger than he was? He filed the observation for later consideration. “And I’d much rather heal than fight, but needs must when the Dark Side drives.”_

_Hux ignored her. “And she has given you no new information? Even under the mind-probe?” He already knew the answer, having read her file (such as it was), but correct form had to be observed._

_“No, sir. Not even her real name. Hasn’t cried out once, even. She’s being very… difficult.” Was that a hint of admiration in the trooper’s voice? Hux chose not to notice it. Even he was a trifle impressed by the rebel girl’s stubbornness._

_“The rebels always are. And General Organa would not send an untrained agent on such a mission. It hardly matters, in any case. The Supreme Leader” – he managed to conceal his intense dislike for the man who had stolen that title – “will be here shortly. If she is still uncooperative by then, he will rectify the situation.” Hux carefully “failed” to see the soldier wincing slightly in sympathy, turning his full attention to the prisoner for the first time._

_He reflected once again that identity documents and verbal portraits seldom did a person justice. The rebel’s file listed her hair and eyes merely as “brown”, rather than trying to capture the red and gold tints in the tangled waves that framed her face, shimmering silver as they caught the light, still partly constrained by half a broken hairclip, or the rich golden-brown hue of her irises, outlined in near-black. (Actually, only her left eye was visible; dried blood from a cut on her forehead obscured the right, forcing her to turn her head to examine him as closely as he was observing her.) The holoimage on her sliced identification did not have enough resolution to display the freckles dusted across her cheekbones, nose and chin, lending colour to a complexion that was otherwise almost as pale as his own. It did show that her overall appearance in its natural state, if not exactly beautiful, was definitely striking. Now, a collection of bruises and cuts indicated that, striking or not, she had certainly been struck – multiple times. Judging by the state of her long, slender hands, she had hit back hard. Both sets of knuckles were split, and there was blood under her fingernails. Probably some of that was her own, he realised, seeing crescent-shaped cuts on her palms – just where her nails must have dug into the flesh as she willed herself not to scream. Along with the toothmarks under her lower lip, they were horribly familiar. He had seen such marks before – on himself._

_Reluctantly, he forced his gaze back to the injury he least wanted to consider. Her tunic had been wrenched open and just enough of her undershirt torn to allow a defibrillator to be applied to her upper chest. The burns looked red and raw, but he somehow had the impression that the slight damage to her dignity was more painful. The way she was shifting about, trying to cover herself while unable to use her hands, had presumably given him that idea. She had been tortured until her heart stopped, and still given nothing away. What could possibly inspire such reckless loyalty?_

_To cover his discomfort, he glanced down at the datapad displaying her file. A full bioscan had been carried out –_ after _she had had to be revived – and found evidence of a congenital heart defect, along with a minor immunological abnormality, a few neurological anomalies, asymmetric myopia and an “above average midichlorian count”, whatever that might be. (He vaguely recalled that it was related to the Force, although she didn’t look or act like a sorcerer. Watching her face Ren might be more entertaining than he had thought…) Presumably these had something to do with the small glasslike lens and subcutaneous implant that had been removed from her left eye and arm respectively, and now lay on a table beside her. The rough bandage on her arm was the only sign of medical care, apart from the burns on her chest. If she survived long enough, the cut under the bandage was sure to scar. For some reason, that made him angry. He knew that torture was occasionally necessary, but there had to be_ limits _. “Which_ idiots _,” he asked the guard, his voice suddenly icy, “used brute force on a subject unlikely to survive? Corpses are not notably cooperative.”_

_“Oh, leave him alone!” Surprisingly, this came from the subject herself. “There was no reason for anyone to suspect that there’s anything wrong with me – apart from being crazy enough to agree to this mission in the first place.” Her outburst stunned both men into momentary silence._

_Hux recovered first, deciding to pretend that the previous exchange had not happened. “I wish to talk to the prisoner alone. See that I am not disturbed.” The stormtrooper complied, and Hux moved to stand next to the girl. Without quite knowing why – unusual for him – he reached across and pulled her tunic back into place. She flinched away at first, then relaxed and smiled at him with all the gratitude she could muster. Some of it spilled into her words as she thanked him. Suddenly taken aback – again, not a common occurrence – he cleared his throat and pressed on with his planned interrogation._

_“Do you know who I am?” The girl gazed at the ceiling, seeming to consult some inner file system. “Certainly. General Armitage Hux, youngest general in the First Order and youngest member of its high command – congratulations, by the way. In overall charge of the stormtrooper training program. Architect of Starkiller Base, and widely blamed for its use against the Hosnian system – although one could argue that the late Supreme Leader Snoke bears the nexu’s share of responsibility there. Pioneer in other technical fields, notably trans-hyperspace tracking. Son of the late Commandant Brendol Hux, head of Arkanis Academy and a nasty piece of work by all accounts.” He must have imagined the flash of sympathy as her eye met his once again. Why would a rebel spy sympathise with_ him _? Or congratulate him, for that matter? “As you said, Leia wouldn’t send an agent in unprepared.”_

_“Why do you call her by her first name?” That wasn’t intentional. It had just slipped out._

_“You’ve never met her, have you?” The girl actually laughed. “It’s impossible to stand on ceremony with her, even though we still regard her as royalty.”_

_That line of questioning would lead nowhere, he could see. He returned to his mental script. “What is your real name?”_

_“Sorry, that’s classified.” Her face, which had come alive as she talked about her princess, had shut down again. So had her tone. As he pursued the routine section of his enquiries, she stonewalled him with variants on “classified” and “no comment”. Finally, he reached the more unusual queries – the real reason for this interrogation._

_“When Lieutenant Mitaka discovered you, you could easily have killed him and made your escape. Instead, you merely rendered him unconscious, surely knowing that he would raise the alarm. Why was that?”_

_The girl seemed to find this equal parts amusing and puzzling. “His life for my possible liberty? Hardly a fair trade. And on a practical level, if his body had been found before I left, you’d have come down on me like a ton of durasteel. How is he, by the way? I didn’t have time to check properly, and no one will tell me.”_

_How did she get past his guard so easily? “Recovering well, as are your other victims.” Her relief was almost tangible. “You consider a stranger’s life more valuable than your own freedom?”_

_Now she was really puzzled. (So, for that matter, was he.) “Of course! Life is far more precious, and much harder to restore. Besides, from where I’m standing – lying, rather – a stranger is a brother or sister I don’t yet know.”_

_The conviction in her voice had wrongfooted him once again. Her reply did, however, explain the point that had first caught his interest. On the security footage of her capture, she could clearly be seen saying to one of her assailants – just before breaking her arm – “I’m so sorry”. How could anyone even reach maturity with an attitude like that, let alone survive in the Resistance? And yet, until now, she had._

_He decided to carry on with his intended questions. “On being apprehended, you were more concerned with destroying and jettisoning your commlink than endeavouring to escape. Why?”_

_Her good eye had focused on him again. Earlier, it had been wandering around the room, but when he had begun to ask his real questions she had returned to examining him in a way that seemed to take in his mind, heart and soul as well as his physical appearance. It reminded him of Ren, but with none of his harshness and intrusiveness. In fact, stars forbid, she almost seemed to_ care _about him. It was an unfamiliar sensation, and one that took a while for him to place._

_“I didn’t want anyone to track it – you_ or _my friends. My life is already forfeit; I intend to use the remainder to stop anyone else getting hurt, let alone killed, on my behalf. I’m sorry about the people I injured trying to escape, but my training just took over. ‘Sides” – a wry smile crossed her face – “if I_ had _got away, I wouldn’t have been a direct threat to anyone else. And I’d rather not have my blood on anyone else’s hands if possible.” She was, as far as Hux could tell, totally sincere, and once again he had no idea how to react. He opted for changing the subject, and picked up the bloodstained device from her arm. “What is this?”_

_The accessing-file look came back. “Pharmaceutical implant. Provides a constant dose of medication for a limited time without the need for oral or intravenous administration – which in the circumstances might have drawn attention. That one was loaded with drugs that stabilise my heart and stop my immune system going into overdrive and messing up my airways.”_

_“So their absence might kill you?” The girl shrugged as best she could. “Eventually. Not before either Ren or one of your people does.” She seemed almost cheerfully resigned to her fate. Hux noted in passing that she called Kylo Ren “Ren”, not “Supreme Leader”. Neither the Resistance nor the New Republic had ever used such titles, he knew. Their Generals and Chancellors were normally considered the first among equals, servants of those they nominally ruled. Usually he would regard such things as egalitarian nonsense, but something about the quiet, utterly determined figure before him was persuading him to think again._

_Silence descended as they studied each other again, neither sure how to proceed. Gradually, Hux became aware of emotions he struggled to recognise. They weren’t his, he was sure. Somehow the girl was projecting her feelings towards him – sympathy, compassion, affection,_ love _. Not romantic love, as far as he could tell, but love all the same. Searching for some rational explanation, he met her one visible eye and saw the same passions there, combined with utter mortification at her lack of self-control. She had reached out to him without thinking, knowing only that he seemed to need it, and now could not stem the flow of raw emotion._

_Mercifully, the alarm siren soon broke the spell. With almost indecent haste, Hux left the room, charged the guard to look after the prisoner and headed off to deal with the emergency – which turned out to be a small but skilled Resistance taskforce invading the ship. Once the dust had settled, the Star Destroyer was short one captive and had gained several damaged TIEs and a number of wounded personnel. Several, including the cell guard, had been carefully placed in the recovery position and any moderate or severe injuries already treated. Hux, for once, contrived to stay out of Ren’s way until the man’s temper had cooled. What with one thing and another, the capture and rescue of one girl soon faded from the First Order’s memory – but not from Hux’s._


	3. An Unexpected Reunion

Back in the present, Hux and El raced as fast as they dared back to base, balancing speed with the need to conceal their destination, and with their depleted energy reserves. It had been a long day, with no time for lunch. Hux could hear El’s steady footsteps keeping pace with him (good), but no sign of pursuit or predators (also good). El’s senses, he knew, would alert them to any danger he couldn’t see or hear, almost certainly with plenty of time to spare. She was definitely getting better. His memory, for reasons of its own, took the opportunity to review its files on their second meeting, so unexpected and in far happier circumstances than the first.

_It was Hux’s first morning at the new Resistance base on Yavin IV, and he was thoroughly lost. Months after Exegol, General Dameron had tracked him down on Arkanis – completely by accident, naturally; did the flyboy ever do anything on purpose? – and persuaded him to help rebuild and run the war-damaged Resistance. He had no idea why Hux had agreed, of course. But this morning Dameron had been called away, recommending the tea apparently on offer at the nurses’ station, and for want of anything better to do Hux was trying to find it. His new colleagues seemed friendly enough for the most part, but usually too preoccupied or too overawed to give him directions, and a few were still openly hostile. Finally, a passing officer he recalled as being a friend of FN-2187, and now apparently a commander, pointed him towards a table outside what seemed to be the med-bay, where a young woman was giving her full attention to some small, fiddly task._

_She looked up as he approached, and he recognised her instantly, even uninjured and in a Resistance nurse’s uniform. The sleeves were pushed up, displaying a jagged scar – maybe half a year old, or a little more – just below her left elbow, and something subtle and nameless had shifted in her ever-moving eyes. Definitely a woman now, not just a girl. She had crossed his mind a few times in the year since he had last seen her, not in a romantic I-can’t-stop-thinking-about-her way, but more as an idea, a symbol. Reminding him that there was a different way of doing things. Had that thought played any part in his recent actions? Probably not, but the galaxy had an odd sense of humour._

_And now she was right in front of him, her generic customer-service smile faltering for a second before becoming an expression of pure, genuine joy. He hadn’t expected that, or to see her at all, though logically both had been strong possibilities given what he knew of her. Spies didn’t usually live long – his still-aching ribs were a reminder of that – but she’d said she was a healer by inclination, hadn’t she? Medical staff tended to be at low physical risk. And someone willing to spare her enemies’ lives at almost any cost would certainly be happy to see a former foe who had seemingly changed sides._

_With that odd sense of extended awareness he remembered so well, he knew she wanted to throw her arms around him, but her sense of decorum turned it into a handshake and a polite “Pleased to meet you – properly. Would you like some tea? The kettle’s just boiled.”_

_He answered in the affirmative, selecting a paricha-flavoured blend from her surprisingly wide range. As she made the tea with an efficiency born of long experience, not wasting a leaf, she added, “Sorry, where are my manners? Do sit down.”_

_He found a chair and complied, accepting the mug she handed him. Unable to stop himself, he asked, “So what_ is _your real name?”_

_Her smile broadened further into a grin as she replied. “Elinor. Nurse Macnab if you want to be formal, El if you need me in a hurry, but mostly just Elinor. What would you prefer to be called?”_

_That, as Dameron might say, threw him into a spin. Taking a sip of tea to give himself time to think, he finally concluded, “Armitage. Or Hux if you would prefer something shorter.”_

_“Armitage it is. Believe me, I’ve got my tongue round worse. Now, do you mind if I carry on with this?” She indicated the circuit board she had been cleaning. A small stack lay on the table in front of her, and a much larger one beside her chair waited to be freed from decades of dust, dirt and dead leaves. He started to get up, but she put out a hand to stop him. “No, it’s fine. I can talk and work at the same time. I just want to get these done today.”_

_Subsiding back into his chair, he drank his tea and watched her in silence for a little while before asking, “Do you want help with that?”_

_“Well, if you want to be useful the boards I’ve done need testing. There’s a diagnostic pad just there.” She pointed to the device in question with the handheld sonicator she had been using. “It’s the most foolproof model imaginable – green light for fine, red for damaged, and they’re labelled as such for people with different colour perceptions. I don’t suppose you know how to fix the wretched things?”_

_“I do, as it happens. Do you have any tools?” She slid across a small box containing a haphazard and mismatched array of equipment, but as far as he could tell everything important. “Thanks a lot. I was_ not _looking forward to that. Anything I haven’t done properly, just give back to me.”_

_“Where are these from?” One circuit board looks very much like another, but these were marked according to a system he couldn’t yet decipher._

_“Oh, all over. There’s a lot of tech left over from the time when this was an Alliance base. Anything too bulky to move when they evacuated after the battle. Three low-level med-droids and a seriously good scanner in med-bay alone, but they all need cleaning out and some intensive corrosion repair. And while I’m doing that for our department, I might as well help out some of the others. That’s how we roll here. If you can do something that needs doing, you do it, even if it’s not strictly your job.” She paused for a mouthful of tea._

_“So these markings indicate where the boards should go?”_

_“Exactly. Can you imagine the muddle otherwise? I remember once –“ and she went off on a long tangent that had something to do with school traditions, stolen chronos and overzealous students. He didn’t follow all of it, but it was still quite amusing, and broke the ice nicely. Soon they were chatting away happily. Hux learned that Elinor was from Naboo (which explained the accent), where her parents – a teacher and a librarian – still lived. She had two younger sisters, both at university, and had trained as a nurse on Coruscant. General Organa – Hux still couldn’t think of her as Leia – had recruited her straight out of training, less than a year before Starkiller. She hadn’t contacted her family since. “Safest way. If they don’t know where I am, they can’t tell anybody else. And if nobody knows they’re my family, no-one will ask.” Her tone was casual, but Hux could tell that the separation hurt. In return, he told her about his mother, and Arkanis, and how he had returned there after Pryde tried to execute him, and how Dameron had found him. In the middle of that last part, she held up a hand to stop him, and moments later a young man in an engineer’s uniform – Hux had asked her about the dress codes early on in the conversation – approached, holding his arm, which was bleeding badly._

_“Show me,” Elinor said, shoving her other work aside and picking up the tools of her usual trade. Oddly, Hux was_ aware _of the cut on the young man’s forearm – long but shallow, nowhere near as bad as it looked – more than he felt he should be, and he_ knew _that Elinor was aware of it too. As she cleaned and dressed the wound, she gently berated him for not taking more care, but he seemed to have tuned out. Clearly this was a regular occurrence. Finally, she said, “Right, that’s you all fixed up. Take an early lunch break, rest that arm for a few hours, and try not to let me see you here for at least a week, OK? Except for tea and caf.”_

_The young man paid her no attention. He had noticed Hux, and was looking at him with disbelief and hostility. “Oh, this is Armitage. He’s new,” Elinor said, trying to thaw the sudden freeze in the atmosphere. “Armitage, this is –“_

_“I know who he is.” The young man turned and walked away without another word, leaving Hux still frozen and Elinor shaking her head. “I suspect you’ll get a bit of that at first, I’m afraid. He’s a good lad, but unbelievably careless, and like a lot of us he lost some close friends on the way to Crait. He’s wrong, though. He might know who you_ were _, but not who you_ are _, which is what counts. Remember that.” Her smile, never really absent, became encouraging. “Now, what were you saying before?” And they continued to chat about this, that and the other, right up until Elinor stopped mid-sentence, exclaimed “Oh, for crying out loud!”, snatched up one of the hypos on the table, untangled herself from her chair and ran towards a growing knot of people halfway across the base._

_With nothing better to do, Hux followed her, reaching the increasingly large crowd just before the gap she had made shouldering and ‘scuse-me-ing her way through closed. The centre of attention appeared to be a slightly older man, this one a technician, who seemed to be having some kind of violent seizure. Elinor was trying to get near him to use the hypo, but his flailing limbs meant she had to twist and bend in a way he was sure humans should not be able to manage. As an errant fist caught her on the cheekbone, for a moment he thought he felt the impact on his own face. At last she managed to get close enough to dose him with whatever she was carrying. The effect was immediate. The seizure stopped, and the man lay still while Elinor checked him over._

_“All right, the show’s over!” This came from the commander who had given directions to Hux earlier, as she chivvied the crowd back to work. While they dispersed, apart from Hux, she came over to the nurse and her patient and asked in a low voice, “How is he?”_

_“Should be fine, but I’d like to check for cumulative damage and make sure he’s been taking his medication. I suspect not, but if he has, we’ll need to change the prescription again.”_

_“Do you want a hand getting him to med-bay?” Elinor glanced at Hux, who indicated his injured leg and shook his head regretfully. “Yes, please.”_

_The two women half-carried, half-steered their charge back to the med-bay, with Hux bringing up the rear. No-one gave them a second look. Feeling surplus to requirements, Hux started working out the system of markings on the cleaned and repaired circuit boards and sorting them accordingly. The commander joined him a few minutes later. Her name, it turned out, was Rose Tico, and she was originally from Hays Minor. She had joined the Resistance a few years before – she left the reason vague, but Hux knew the planet by reputation and could make a good guess – and been promoted after her and FN-2187’s (Finn, now, he had to remember) attempt at sabotaging the_ Supremacy _’s hyperspace tracker, followed by her near-sacrifice stopping Finn from killing himself on Crait. She didn’t quite put it like that, but that was the general gist. Her attitude to him was guarded, as he would expect given her past, but she seemed prepared to endure him, at least, for Finn’s sake. (She certainly didn’t put it like_ that, _but he could read between the lines and suspected that if this woman and the ex-stormtrooper were not already an item, they soon would be.)_

_Elinor emerged from med-bay while they were still talking, followed by a small droid who consisted mainly of a single wheel and a truncated cone. “He’ll be fine. A bit groggy still, but a few hours’ rest should fix that. Any more skipped doses, though, and he’ll need an implant.” She noticed what they had been doing. “Any of those for med-bay? MB markings, as you no doubt realised.” She took the stack Hux handed her and gave them to the droid. “Cheers. There you go, D-O. Oh, before you go, this is Armitage. He’s new. Armitage, this is D-O. He’s been helping us with the move. Dr Kalonia and I are hoping to second him permanently, once we can get both generals’ attention for five minutes together.” The droid danced back and forth in what appeared to be his version of “Welcome”. “Happy”, he stuttered._

_“Yes, very,” Hux agreed gravely. Rose and Elinor exchanged glances, and all three humans burst out laughing, while the bemused droid made a bid for the safety and sanity of med-bay._


	4. Hidden Threats

The tide of memory receded somewhat as Hux’s eyes – or possibly El’s senses; it was getting harder to tell – warned him of a low branch in dangerous conjunction with a protruding root. Yavin IV’s forests allowed non-native species and the paths they made only on sufferance. Navigating the pair of obstacles, and glancing back to check on his teammate, he skimmed through his mental records of the weeks since meeting her again at high speed. He had taken to spending much of his time at the nurses’ station – or rather, as he had quickly realised, nurse’s station – taking advantage of the ready supply of tea and caf as he worked on whatever technical or administrative problem Dameron and FN-2187 wanted him to help solve. Gradually, unexpectedly, he had become a de facto part-time member of the medical corps, raising its complement by a third even counting D-O. Being understaffed seemed to be in the nature of all such establishments, and the Resistance medical frigate had been the first ship to be destroyed during their desperate flight to Crait. The crew had been evacuated, but few if any had returned. Most of the surviving personnel who continued to fight had been invalided out, chosen to return to civilian life after Exegol or in a few cases died in various skirmishes after Crait. Now, apart from El, only Dr Kalonia was left, and she had been partially paralysed since an attack on some nameless base that had left another nurse dead and El with another scar, chronic survivor’s guilt and a burning ambition to heal her mentor come hell or high water. Somehow, they had carried on. The Resistance always did.

Hux had learned a lot in that time, and it wasn’t all medical. The Resistance’s surprisingly intricate office politics. Two sets of opinions on the proper way to brew various teas and types of caf (El’s and those of General Organa’s old protocol droid, C-3PO). An inventive array of definitely-not-curses-honest (El disliked what she called bad language, but had to express her feelings somehow). And, very early on, some surprising facts about the Force and his new friend’s relationship to it – and him.

 _The light was fading on Hux’s first full day at the base, and he and Elinor were finishing both their work and a third round of tea, when he found an opening to ask the question that had been bothering him for hours. Actually, it was a whole series of questions, none of them easy to phrase, but he had a go. “What_ are _you?”_

_Elinor tilted her head to one side. “Can you be more specific?”_

_“You’re Force sensitive, aren’t you? You know precisely what’s happening or about to happen, even at a distance. But you don’t act like a sor- Jedi.”_

_Understanding crossed her previously puzzled face. “The word you’re after is “empath”. A Force-sensitive especially attuned to others’ emotions and sensations, often to such an extent that we can make them our own. Manipulate them, sometimes, or broadcast ours. Don’t get me started on the ethical issues. I stick to being a living painkiller and anxiolytic.”_

_An idea struck Hux. “You did that to me, didn’t you?” Now he came to think of it, the injuries he had received on the_ Steadfast _had stopped troubling him the moment his hand had touched Elinor’s. For some reason, that didn’t bother him as much as it should have._

_She looked apologetic. “’Fraid so. It’s a reflex, now. I can’t see or sense anyone in pain without trying to help.”_

_“And is that why I can tell what you’re feeling sometimes?”_

_Apology turned to alarm. “_ That _shouldn’t be happening, not without my intending it. I’ve always had to be so careful. Either you’re more Force sensitive than you thought, or…” She broke off, frowning._

_“Or?”_

_“There’s not much about empaths in the old texts. The Jedi used to consider us too passionate to be trained in their ways. But I do remember something about a bond that can be formed between an empath and another Force-touched. It’s rare, but it apparently allows the bonded pair to connect over any distance, in either direction and without conscious effort. When I reached out to you last year – for which I apologise, by the way; I shouldn’t have done that without warning or permission – that must have begun the bonding process, but it couldn’t form properly until now.”_

_“Force-touched?” He now had another series of questions, but that was at the top of the list._

_“Anyone chosen by the Force in a way that’s more special than usual. That includes users, sensitives and people who are guided by the Force more than most but can’t sense it easily. There’s no clear cut-off point, so one could argue that everyone is Force-touched in some way.” She looked up at the sky. “It’s getting late. We can talk about this in the morning, when I’ve checked my references.”_

And they had, and the bond between them had continued to strengthen as they spent more time together. They had also learned pretty quickly how to dial it back when one of them didn’t want to burden the other with something. It had become a useful means of communication, too. El could be on the other side of the base, or Hux at home in the house he now shared with Dameron and his droid, but they would both be at the scene of any emergency in minutes. He hadn’t realised that emotion could be a language of its own, but they could chat quite happily for hours without exchanging a word, or even being in the same building.

Right now, his El-sense was telling him that she was beginning to flag, and the blaster injury she had picked up earlier in the day was making itself known despite his best efforts at fixing it. Just persuading her to let him tend it, rather than pressing on with (and thus potentially endangering) the mission, had been hard. It wasn’t serious – a glancing blow to her left leg just below the hip – but he’d _known_ it had hurt despite her attempts to imply the contrary. And she’d just been supporting him after a scrap with a patrol had reopened the old wounds on his chest and thigh. As soon as they’d reached temporary shelter, she had patched him up with some new formulation that was apparently much better for deep-tissue damage than standard bacta – on which, nevertheless, she had insisted when he finally convinced her to let him do the same for her.

He slackened his pace as much as he dared before her stubbornness got her killed (again). It was starting to get dangerously close to curfew, and these forests were even more perilous at night. So were their inhabitants. The curfew had been imposed a couple of weeks before, when a Resistance perimeter guard had been brought back critically injured after an encounter with some wild animal. It had taken all night, the whole team and one of El’s unusual gifts just to stabilise her.

Even at the slower pace, El was still tiring, and seemed to be pulling back from his awareness. Curious and concerned, he turned just in time to see her fall.

At first, he thought she had just tripped, but when he reached her and slipped a hesitant arm under hers to try to pull her up, he realised she was barely breathing. He didn’t need the biomonitor she always wore to tell him what had happened. Her immune system, free of its usual pharmaceutical restraints, had overreacted catastrophically to the day’s events and caused her airways to contract until she needed all her remaining strength just to stay alive. He could feel her heart, her _damaged_ heart, beating too fast and far too hard as it circulated what little oxygen she could scavenge. This must have been building for some time, but she hadn’t called out or slowed down. _Idiot._

He knew where she kept the inhaler containing her emergency medication and offered it to her, but she shook her head almost imperceptibly. Using it required her to do the one thing she currently couldn’t – breathe. As desperation started to take root, he rifled through her med-kit, looking for something he could use. Worryingly, she didn’t react as she normally would to this violation of her personal belongings. Every suggestion was rejected, most likely because anything strong enough to reopen her airways in time would probably stop her heart as well.

She twisted slightly to display the chain around her neck, usually where she kept a small holorecorder containing her diary and images of her family, but currently carrying the datastick with all the information they had taken from the stormtroopers’ shuttle. “Go…” The word was barely a whisper.

Hux reached out for it automatically, but hesitated. She thought – or knew – that she was dying, and wanted him to leave her and complete their mission. It was the logical thing to do. If he left now, he could easily make it back to base by curfew. Carrying her – no chance. She’d be dead by the time they got there anyway, and he’d be endangering himself. The son his _father_ had wanted wouldn’t have thought twice. The man he had been so recently might have put her out of her misery first, as painlessly as possible, rather than leave her for the stormtroopers, the beasts or her own malfunctioning body. The person he was becoming rejected both possibilities. Leaving a friend to suffer and die was unthinkable, and he was learning that “mercy killing” was a contradiction in terms. Mercy would be walking with her to the gates of death, letting her know she was not alone.

And that was precisely what he intended to do, if she would just let him into her head again. She had pulled away as far as she could, not wanting to inflict her death on him. She’d taken away pain and fear from so many dying men and women, Resistance and First Order alike, and wouldn’t wish that on her worst enemy, let alone her best friend. Well, to blazes with that. She was _his_ best friend, too. As he knelt beside her, pulling her into his lap such that her head rested on his chest and his arms cradled her upper body, one hand threaded through the soft curls that had escaped from her braid, she glared up at him and repeated even more quietly, but more insistently, “ _Go!_ ”

“I’m not leaving you.” Hux rested a hand on the side of her head and closed his eyes, reaching for her mind. There were barriers all around it. He resisted the temptation to try to smash them down. That would be painful, and weaken her even further. Instead, he was going to take some advice from an unexpected source – the man he had once known as Kylo Ren.

He couldn’t remember now how the subject had arisen, but he recalled Solo – now firmly back with his late mother’s organisation and his dyad partner – talking about getting through to someone in situations like this. _A person’s walls are extensions of their personality. Think about what you_ know _about that person. Focus on anything you have in common. That should show you the way in._

Hux summoned everything he _knew_ about Elinor. Stubborn as a bantha – hence this mess – and with about the same natural tact. Easily annoyed when things didn’t go to plan or others messed up her carefully planned systems. Obsessively neat, bordering on neurotic. Quick-tempered. Painfully aware that life had dealt her a good hand, and determined to use that for the benefit of all players. Prim and proper outside; wild as an ocean storm inside. Too proud for her own comfort. Smart, but lacking in what might be called social intelligence. Congenitally honest, so straightforward you could use her as a ruler, and consequently horribly easy to tease. Loved a good joke, nonetheless. Utterly loyal to her cause and her loved ones. Poured as much energy into her friendships as most put into a romantic relationship. Deft and dexterous when she was giving her full attention to a task; clumsy when she wasn’t. Cared so deeply for everyone in the galaxy, even her nominal enemies. Eternally, relentlessly optimistic. So dedicated to her work, she could barely remember what “off duty” meant. So kind, so gentle, so recklessly trusting. Generous and selfless to the point of lunacy, and probably beyond. They had so much in common, and so much else that was diametrically opposed, that it was like looking into a mirror. Two people reflecting each other, one loved and sheltered for much of her life (too much, perhaps), the other… not. Could he have been like this, in other circumstances? Could he become this even now?

Her mental walls seemed to melt away in places, or perhaps merge with his once more. Surprisingly, there was little pain – just a crushing pressure on her chest. What she _was_ feeling was overwhelming fear. Not of death itself, which she regarded as a change, not an ending. Of not seeing her family again. Of hurting those who loved her. Of leaving a hole in their lives. Of, above all, _failing_. That fear was killing her just as much as her physical problems. Well, he could do something about that, at least.

El didn’t exactly erase pain and fear. She simply moved them somewhere they would do less damage – herself initially, then anything that wouldn’t be ruined by a little heat. (Or, more usually, a lot of heat. She had used a friend’s death-agony as a welding torch once.) Hux had paid attention while she tended her patients, and was sure he could do the same for her. She was used to pain; he had grown used to fear. And if that didn’t work, he had also paid attention when the injured perimeter guard had nearly slipped away from them and El had – there was no other phrase for it – plunged after her, seeming to merge their life forces together in an empathic lifesaver’s hold until the other woman was out of danger.

Reassuring her out loud as best he could, telling her that she could do this, she was strong, she was a survivor, and other such near-meaningless things, he let her fear flow out of her mind into his before earthing it in the ground, which froze under his fingers. (Fear externalised as coldness? He filed the observation for later discussion.) Almost immediately, the deadly pressure began to loosen its grip, although it still seemed hours – but was probably just minutes – before she was in a position to use her inhaler. That helped a lot. Moments later, she was able to sit up by herself and fish for her emergency sweet supply, which also helped. The first words out of her mouth were a heartfelt if unnecessary “ _Thank you_ ”.

“Can you stand?” The light was fading fast now. No time to waste.

“Only one way to find out.” The answer turned out to be yes. Running on sugar and salbutamol, she loped after him back towards their homes.

“You were right, by the way,” Hux called over his shoulder.

“About what?” A slight sense of confusion, equivalent to a head-tilt.

“Life _is_ precious. Thank you for showing me that.” He’d only fully realised it as hers slid away from him. She might not be physically beautiful, but her life force was, and it had so nearly been lost. Was everyone like that at the core? He had no reason to think otherwise.

“No, thank _you_ for reminding me. I’m my own worst enemy sometimes – in more ways than one.” He could imagine her wry smile. They carried on in silence, heading for the now-familiar landmark of the old temple at the centre of the base, for their friends, a good meal, a couple of hours in the refresher and whatever dressing-down their late arrival and general shenanigans would earn them. Not necessarily in that order. But for now, they were content to review their memories of the day – lives saved and spared, a mission accomplished, and victories won against enemies both external and internal. And, above all, an unlikely friendship cemented, with any luck, for good.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Any and all feedback, positive or constructive-negative, is very welcome. I'd especially like to know whether my Force-nonsense actually makes sense within the wider canon framework.


End file.
